GM fiat - an illustration

[thefutilist]

Note that "the GM makes a ruling" is almost always in fact synonymous with "the GM fiat's the response."

If the answer was instead "the GM refers to the prep or rolls on a table" then IMO that would not be fiat, because that sort of thing is established and principled.

Most fiat is principled, you just need to find out what the principle is.
Four somewhat common principles:


Ask what would be there, if indeterminate then decide yes and think about what clues it could offer.

Ask what would be there, if indeterminate then nothing that actively harms or helps, so nothing.

Make something be there that hits a flag (the cameras reveal it was one of the characters lovers), unless this overloads the pacing.

Have something be there but it's another clue that leads to the next clue in the sequence (roads to Rome).

 

[soviet]

Another serious question. If this is the case, how can you have the players solve an objective mystery if everything needs to relate to their subjective values, passions, etc? (and I am not saying those things are bad, I can see the value in play those would add, I just can't see how you have them functionally solving a real mystery)

To answer this from a non-AW narr perspective:

i) you bake the details of the mystery so that they echo and/or directly impact or provoke the PC's own issues. The PC is focused on issues around maintaining relations with their family? The murder victim also had a fraught relationship with their family. The PC is in conflict with their superiors? Those superiors have some sort of vested interest in this case.

Ii) solving (or not) this particular case may be secondary in importance to playing out the conflicts above that the case provokes

 

[Maxperson]

As I said… it would seem to me that the process is largely “the GM decides” which is fine… but for some reason there’s reluctance or inability to discuss that.

And you are still wrong about that. As I've said multiple times to you, I don't engage in bad faith shutting down PC options like you listed in that post upthread.

 

[Bedrockgames]

If the GM determines which of several methods is used to get to the outcome, to some extent that itself is fiat, no? 'I decree this one will be a coin flip'

I think because Fiat has a strong connotation of decree or proclamation, people tend to see it as mostly meaning 'the GM decides this happens'. Rather than 'the GM decides how to resolve what happens'. Fiat sounds like "The GM decides what happens next". So personally I think it is better to use ruling and talk more about what that can mean

 

[soviet]

I think because Fiat has a strong connotation of decree or proclamation, people tend to see it as mostly meaning 'the GM decides this happens'. Rather than 'the GM decides how to resolve what happens'. Fiat sounds like "The GM decides what happens next". So personally I think it is better to use ruling and talk more about what that can mean

I dunno I find trying to define fiat removes the ineffable magic of it

 

[Bedrockgames]

To answer this from a non-AW narr perspective:

i) you bake the details of the mystery so that they echo and/or directly impact or provoke the PC's own issues. The PC is focused on issues around maintaining relations with their family? The murder victim also had a fraught relationship with their family. The PC is in conflict with their superiors? Those superiors have some sort of vested interest in this case.

Ii) solving (or not) this particular case may be secondary in importance to playing out the conflicts above that the case provokes

Are they objectively solving it. I.E. These details are concrete and can be discovered in play: the murderer always used a red baseball bat to kill the victim. So when they saw the victim's uncle in a photograph with a similar looking red bat from his baseball days, they put two and two together and they were actually putting two and two together. And those facts were discoverable the whole time (the baseball bat didn't become red after the fact)

 

[Bedrockgames]

I dunno I find trying to define fiat removes the ineffable magic of it

Well you got me there. But I still say it tends to lead people into thinking that teh GM is just narrating what happens all the time

 

[Maxperson]

So this is the thing… to run with the sketched scenario…

The players mention the cameras. This prompts the GM to make a ruling of some sort. How does he determine what the cameras reveal? How helpful that information may be? How incomplete? And so on.

No. I already told you that it may never even get to that point. Quite often the players find something like cameras, but they ignore it or put it off until later.

So I can't give you a response about what happens next, because I don't know what happens next. That's up to the players.

 

[soviet]

Are they objectively solving it. I.E. These details are concrete and can be discovered in play: the murderer always used a red baseball bat to kill the victim. So when they saw the victim's uncle in a photograph with a similar looking red bat from his baseball days, they put two and two together and they were actually putting two and two together. And those facts were discoverable the whole time (the baseball bat didn't become red after the fact)

In my games yes

 

[Bedrockgames]

In my games yes

Then I would say they are solving an objective mystery